You're not lost!

I tried changing my blog skin, but I completely stink at it. Anyway, you're not in the wrong place.
-Me

Joy, gratitude, hope and energy for every day of this new year!

Happy New Year, gang! I know 2009 was a rough year for lots of people. I can't personally concur with that -- Joel, so far, remains employed; I have managed to keep the children alive for another year; and we have received many, many blessings. But I hope for better things in 2010. Back in September or October I was moved to write down these 4 words as a reminder to myself: "Be a safe haven." And I hope to continue that in this new year. I want to be a better mother, wife, friend, daughter, sister, citizen. I want to be a "happy place" whenever I can; I want to be a comfort, a balm, a joyful presence. In 2010 I pray for my words and actions to heal, not hurt. I won't succeed; I'm human, after all, and what a flawed, imperfect, fallible thing to be. But I can try.

We spent New Year's Eve at Aaron & Kary's new house in Minneapolis, near Tricia's old neighborhood, with much of our coed softball team. It was great to catch up with everyone, though I'm really aging out of late-late parties. Highlights for me were chatting with a first-time-pregnant teammate, hanging with Julie Gronau's German friends, Chelsie's Buffalo Wing dip and passing Chelsie's extremely rigorous are-you-sober-enough-to-drive-home test.

Friday night Stu and Julie (with Wini, Dash, and Rufus the Good Dog Who Makes Poor Choices in tow) swung by on their way home from Monticello, and we had a lovely visit with them on Saturday. Stu helped me back up the photo and music files I had stored on my computer, and we solved most of the world's problems while subsisting on coffee, leftovers, and Christmas cookies. We miss them.

Last night Joel and the kids and I were invited to my friend-from-ECFE Priya's apartment for an Indian Programme. One of the moms is a classically-trained Indian dancer and she's been working with a group of seven young girls on an Indian dance. The girls all wore traditional dresses and jewelry and they did a fantastic job! A couple older kids played the piano, and one of the dads played some traditional Indian songs on the violin. Then we all had Indian potluck and chatted (and Joel and I scored an open-door invitation to stay with Priya's parents the next time we're in southern India -- Priya said it was because her dad thinks I'm pretty), and the kids ran around like recently-uncaged animals. It was a really wonderful and unique experience for a crazy-cold evening.

Each year Joel's mom gifts me a "Daily Guideposts" book with a short inspirational essay to read to start each day. (I typically peter out in March, pick it back up around my birthday in June, then skip to the holidays when I sporadically pick it back up again. *shrug*) I really liked the January 1 message, which included a quote from Dr. Lew Smedes:

"...Be blessed with
Joys deeper than any sadness,
Gratitude happier than any regrets,
Hopes brighter than the shadows of any discouragement,
and the vitality to make of every day what God on Christmas Day made
for all days."

Warm wishes for this chilly start of 2010!

Oh Christmas cookies Oh Christmas cookies, how yummy in my tummy

Quick note while my Yogi Bedtime tea is brewing. This tea, btw, is THE MOST AWESOME TEA EVER. Aunt Jan used to have it and the flavor really is something fabulous. I am going to take my tea and some Christmas Chex Mix up to bed and I am going to read a bit of the last Twilight book before retiring for the evening. And because I REALLY want to drink my tea in bed, I am bringing up with me my floss, toothbrush, toothpaste, cup, pitcher of water (would that be a "ewer"? I really want it to be), and something to spit in. I have grown tired of having no running water on the level where I sleep, so how does that saying go -- if the mountain won't come to Mohammed then Mohammed must go to the mountain? I'm not sure whether I'm the mountain or Mohammed in that analogy; all I know is, tonight I'm eating bedtime snack IN BED. And then NOT GETTING OUT OF IT.

Cute Eddie story I already Facebooked but still must share:

I'm standing, looking at a random piece of paper that mentions "Beauty and the Beast" -- no pictures, just the typed words. Ed can't even SEE it from his angle. Then out of nowhere Eddie sings: "Beauty and the beast..." Me: Why did you sing that? Ed: "I heard it in my heart."

So weird.

Both kids are crazy-excited about Christmas. Lucy has, since the start of school, learned this school-age-kid THING where she hears something she likes and starts jumping up and down and screaming. This is SO something she has learned from other kids -- I can totally picture groups of little kids doing it. She does it any time we talk about Christmas coming soon.

Ed is quick to remind us that "It's not Christmas YET!" which is so Roman Catholic of him -- I totally remember singing "O Come O Come Emmanuel" right up into Christmas Eve and then only getting to sing "Silent Night," "Angels We Have Heard On High," etc AFTER the birth. Mom always got really annoyed by that, for one because "O Come Emmanuel" is little more than a dirge, and B. it's a total waste of all the gorgeous Christmas songs out there. I completely agree with her.

My cards are written, stuffed, and addressed (just awaiting stamps, which are awaiting purchase following Friday's payday). No letter this year -- I might write a little ditty on here closer to Christmas. Most of my presents are bought (though I totally dropped the ball on ECFE and dance-teacher gifts, and I only have a couple more days to work on Lucy's teacher-gift. I'm new at this!!). Lucy's class is making faux-gingerbread houses on Friday, with which I'm excited to help. Joel and I are taking the kids to a Santa breakfast up at the rec center on Saturday, and Joel's family is doing a pre-Christmas Christmas party on Sunday... and then Christmas break is underway! Lucy actually has school Mon and Tues next week, but all other activities are on hold until the new year. It will be nice... but what the heck are we going to DO for 2 weeks!?!?

OK my tea is ready. Good night!

Radio love

Joel just spent about an hour installing our (my) new under-cabinet radio. (Our old one has been slowly giving up the ghost for the past year or so... the volume would cut in and out... then it wouldn't play CDs... it started roaring during All Things Considered... next, the clock broke... it forgot its preset stations... then the static became unbearable. It was a very long and painful death.)

The new one plays no CDs which is OK since I am mostly switched to iPod. On that note, anybody know the best way to back up iTunes? A couple of my favorite RMHS alumni have recently lost all their iTunes and I'd like to avoid that.

So Joel drilled and twisted and knocked and screwed and now I have a functioning soundmaker to cook and blog to. And believe me, I NEED noise to cook to -- I recently wrote a love letter to NPR extolling how I do not care to cook unless NPR is on in the background. Since Joel and the kids care very much to eat, a radio was required.

Anyway, when I plugged in the iPod, the very first song it played was the song Joel and I used for our first dance at our wedding, Lyle Lovett's "She's No Lady." All together now: awwwwww!!!

I think I need to get on Twitter.

1. What is it about a dumped cup of milk that makes little kids just sit and stare at it, making no noise or movement that would indicate they cared whatsoever that their laps, the table, the chair and floor are FULL OF MILK???

2. I'm trying to upload pics to Shutterfly -- I think I always used Snapfish in the past but I'm switching -- does it really take 2 hours to upload 200 pics?

3. Here's Eddie's lunch order, every day, for the last three months: "Cinnamon on bread wiff no crust and no top and peanut butter on the side and honey on the peanut butter."

Translation: Cut the crust off a piece of toast, sprinkle it with cinnamon, put a glob of PB on the plate and squirt a bit of honey on the PB. ("No top" simply means "open-faced") Eddie says his phrase superfast, with a nice dramatic, sing-songy ritard for the last 4 words. It's adorable.

Advent wreath

I'd decided I wanted to do some more spiritually-based Christmas traditions this year with the kiddos, so I went out looking for Advent wreaths and calendars to try to get a start.

Well, it turns out an Advent wreath can take many forms besides the three-purple-candles-and-a-pink-one I'd remembered from St. Colette. I was going to try to make one out of pine cones but couldn't locate the spool of florist-wire we used to make the bouquets for our wedding (imagine that: I couldn't find something I hadn't used in 9.5 years!)

Anyway, short story long, I didn't want to spend hours of assembly time, but I still liked the idea and decided to make it as simple as possible. And I found this website which not only explains the purpose of the tradition (mainly, just to visually count down the weeks until Christmas) but also gave a really neat way to celebrate it around our dinner table. It also incorporates readings from Isaiah, which I'd wanted to include but didn't think the kids would maintain interest in it through all 66 chapters (plus, have you READ Isaiah? The first half is exceptionally and graphically depressing). In my typical cheapskate way, I dug out one of our Christmas plates and the candles we'd used in the jack o'lanterns.

Anyway here goes: it's meant to be a jumping-off point for families/groups to "make it their own" but this is pretty much exactly what we're doing:

On the first Sunday in Advent

• Light one purple candle (ours will be red and white, that's what we have)
  
• Read Isaiah 60:2-3
• Pray something like this:

  Lord God, we light this candle to thank you for your Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who is the light of the world. We who have sat in darkness have seen a great light, the light of Jesus Christ, our salvation. We give you thanks and praise in Jesus' name, because he lives and reigns with you in your glory, and in the unity of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

On the second Sunday in Advent

• Light two candles
• Read Mark 1:4
• Pray something like this:

  Lord God, we light this candle to thank you for your Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who is the way. We who like sheep have gone astray have found the way to you through Jesus Christ. We give you thanks and praise in Jesus' name, because he lives and reigns with you in your glory, and in the unity of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

On the third Sunday in Advent

• Light three candles
• Read Isaiah 35:10
• Pray something like this:

  Lord God, we light this candle to thank you for your Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who brings us great joy. We who have walked in the shadow of the valley of death have found life in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We give you thanks and praise in Jesus' name, because he lives and reigns with you in your glory, and in the unity of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

On the fourth Sunday in Advent

• Light 4 candles
• Read Isaiah 9:6-7
• Pray something like this:

  Lord God, we light this candle to thank you for your Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who is the Prince of Peace. We who live in discord and strife have found peace in the promise of eternal life, through Jesus Christ. We give you thanks and praise in Jesus' name, because he lives and reigns with you in your glory, and in the unity of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

On Christmas Eve after sundown or on Christmas Day
(if you have a fifth white candle in the center)

• Light all the purple candles and the white candle
• Read Luke 1:68-79 and Luke 2:1-20
• Pray something like this:

  We praise you, Lord God, because on this day, your Word became flesh in our Savior Jesus Christ, was born of a woman, and walked among us as a man. Help us to imitate your incarnation, by manifesting our faith in our conduct as well as in our speech. To you, O Lord, we give our honor, praise, worship, and love, in the most holy and precious name of the One who is born today; because He lives and reigns with you in your glory, and in the unity of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Killing the earth through dishes

Hey, who was with me on my earlier dishwashing-detergent discussion?
I've only owned a dishwasher for 23 months but I started using Electrasol (AKA "Finish") and then started trying the more earth-friendly brands. Unfortunately the earth-friendly detergents are LOUSY.

I had a couple people recommend Seventh Generation and I'm dreadfully sorry but it is no better than the rest. I've heard Method is great but I cannot justify the cost -- it's like six times as much! Two days back on the Finish train and I'm happy as a clam, with the cleanest dishes in town.

A nice quote from Mary Hunt, author of "Everyday Cheapskate"

"The wild accumulation of things creates an endless urge to have more.

For those searching for contentment in status symbols and stuff, enough is never enough. The "have-nots" want some; the "have-enoughs" want more; even the "have-too-muches" want more still.

...Having too many things dilutes quality of life and ... having it all is highly overrated."



I just pulled about 50 CDs out of the garage that I completely forgot I even had. (50 is all I could carry -- I bet there are 50+ still in there.) Some of it is junk, like the CD from Dennis & Sally's wedding... some of it is really good music I'd just forgotten about. The point being: it's been YEARS, maybe 3 years, and I didn't miss it. At all. Well, OK, I missed my Oasis CD and that's what I was doing out there. But seriously, I need to clear this kind of clutter out of my life.

Ooops!

I forgot to mention, Monday Nov 30 is my parents' 35th wedding anniversary! Love you lots, Mom and Dad -- thanks for marrying each other!

(This is as close as I could get to a recent photo of them together. Sorry)

Here's what I know about their courtship: they met sometime in the winter of 1973-74 in the American Airlines employee parking lot -- Mom (who also worked for AA at the time) was supposed to catch a ride home with someone whose car wouldn't start, and Dad stopped by to see what the trouble was, and they pulled tennis racquets out of the trunk and hit around a little while waiting for a tow. Later that winter they wound up on the same ski trip out west... and they were married that November, 1974.

They always maintain that Dad never asked Mom to marry him; I think sometime in late summer 1974, Nana (Dad's mom) asked them when they were getting married and they chose November. Mom wore Dad's brother (my uncle) Tom's then-wife's wedding dress and Dad wore a blue ruffly shirt with a tuxedo and Dad's brother Jack and Mom's sister Jan stood up for them and they had a small reception at one of Mom's aunt's or grandma's houses in Chicago.

Happy Anniversary you guys!!

Thankful. (Oh but don't expect a whole mooshy post about that)

Hello my darlings!
Long time no post, I know. And look, this one will be a total waste of your time.

We had a really wonderful Thanksgiving with Joel's parents in Monti (including a WAY fun ride on the new Northstar Lightrail -- highly recommend it!) and then got to meet Alley Joel and Cara's new baby, Elizabeth, and then drove down to Rolling Meadows for some post-Thanksgiving family time. Jean flew in, too, and Ellen and her boyfriend came out from the city, and it was so great to all get together. On the way home we stopped briefly in Milwaukee to catch up with Peg and John and Jack and there's nothing like old friends you can just pick right back up with.

I'm super-psyched about the Christmas season this year -- we've got a nice mix of family, adult, and girls-only parties; some old traditions to carry on... and some new ones to start. I am bummed that the Anita Kerr Singers' 1969 album "Spend this Holiday with Me" isn't available except on vinyl, but I DID get to hear it once, to kick my season off right. And my dad made it up to me by handing over one of Grandma Jake's Jane Monheit CDs. Happiness!

Tomorrow night I meet my Wilder Foundation Neighborhood Leadership Program coachee (this is the program I participated in last year; this year, despite my utter lack of experience, I am a "coach") -- she's a young woman from Liberia (and I'm a little embarrassed to admit I just Googled that to see where it was -- and to save you the trouble, it's on the west coast of Africa) who sounds super energetic and enthusiastic (from what I can tell from her 4-page questionnaire). I'm excited to meet her, but nervous because I have to essentially sit down and interview her for maybe 30 minutes. I hope she picks up on our shared enthusiasm and doesn't mind my spazzy ignorance. If she's looking for a cheerleader we'll be a good fit; if she's looking for a wealth of contacts and resources, well... perhaps I can show her how to work the Internets.

OK anyway! The kids were total angels all weekend -- golly do I adore them. And now I must hit the sack -- a great big month is looming.

"Being a part of something special MAKES you special." -- Rachel Berry, Glee

Hey there, just a quick Thursday morning update --
Joel, the kids and I have spent much of the week battling various coughs, fevers, and colds -- the kids had fevers earlier this week and last night coughed a lot throughout the night (but still slept okay, I think)... Joel was feeling yucky for a couple days... and I have been hanging in there but this morning woke up stuffy and migrainey. Ugh! We've been SO lucky the past several years that I guess it's just our turn to go through this massive yuckiness.

Annie has been going just great -- we've had several sold-out houses, and this weekend we have 4 performances, 3 of which are already sold out. It's SO exciting to be part of something like this. I feel like every time I do a big show (which I haven't, now, for 4.5 years!), I come away with some awesome new friends. It's a wonderful and exhausting experience.

Meanwhile, our yard is absolutely blanketed with oak leaves. It's been gorgeous here the last 5 days but a cloudy front has moved in and it really looks like November today. Every once in a while little mini-tornadoes of leaves pick up and spin a little bit. I remember one day last fall (it was a nice day -- the windows were open in the car) I stopped at a stop sign down the block. And a little mini-leaf-tornado started coming at our car, and a bunch of teenagers on the corner started hollering as though they thought it was going to carry them away. It blew right through the car and honestly it was a teeny bit scary! I much prefer to watch it from inside my cozy home.

It's 8:37 AM and Eddie's still sleeping, though I can hear him coughing so I bet he's waking up. I called us in sick to Bible study this morning, which is a bummer, but I would really prefer that Lucy save her energy for school this afternoon. Also we have conferences with her teacher this evening -- very exciting, can't wait! And I've got a show tonight so I'm going to try to get the house in decent order for the weekend and then relax a bit. Possibly snuggling with my Neti Pot, some kleenexes, and several tubes of Airborne and Zicam.

We recently had some family pics done -- please drop me a line if you want to see them.

Bollywood!

Hey there! That bollywood wedding dance I choreo-ed is on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdW0iPBbUTo

I'm so proud! But such is the plight of the choreographer: now I really want to perform it myself. :)

Halloweenie

Our darling neighbors, the Alleys, moved last week and they got the MOST AWESOME TRUCK.
We carved pumpkins 2 weeks early. We ended up with 5 pumpkins out of our garden (#6 got harvested and then I knocked it off the retaining wall with the van -- it exploded upon impact).
We let Lucy draw the faces on the pumpkins with marker, and then Joel and I took some artistic liberties with her vision (with steak knives). If you click on the photo below to enlarge, you can see that the pumpkin on the right has 2 top choppers to represent Ed's missing ones, and the pumpkin on the left has 1 lower tooth, for Lucy's (oh, whoops, upon inspection the Lucy-tooth one is not pictured here -- sorry!). The squirrels have since done some pretty severe damage.
Here are the kids dressed for tumbling this morning:
People ask Ed whether he's a pirate, a warrior, a knight, a soldier... and he always responds "I'm a HERO." And I can't even tell you how many times I had to answer "Mama, where is my Sword of Truth?" this morning. Lots.
Aaaaand... Lucy waiting for the bus.
Joel helped her look up "Flappers" on the internet and everything.

At her school, they let the teachers choose whether or not to celebrate, and I'm surprised how delighted I am that Lucy's class is having a party. I don't really have strong feelings about Halloween (neither for nor against -- though I sure like candy! and dressing up!), but I was a bit appalled when I heard last year that some schools were prohibiting kids from dressing up at all... to the point where they said that kids with any sort of color in their hair would be sent home. I mean, it's a public school and presumably kids would be allowed to have different-colored hair any other day of the school year, but not on Halloween? At some point I feel like that's starting to infringe on civil liberties... but I also think it's a mistake to think that being respectful of diverse cultures means we don't celebrate anything. I mean, how else are we supposed to understand each other and get along in this crazy world, if we don't acknowledge what different cultures get excited about, and why? Plus I usually think more parties is generally a good thing.

It's a new week, thank goodness

Last week was not a good week for us -- I came down with some dreadful fever/achey thing on Thurs and was pretty much in a tunnel until Sunday. Thank goodness my dad was here to help with the kids and make me tea and buy me Jarlsberg and ginger snaps and caramel-coffee ice cream.
Ed has grown another inch since September. This pic is from their first tumbling class, about a month ago.

Beautiful princesses:

Update

Connor passed away yesterday afternoon -- the update is on the caringbridge site.

No Bad News

"No Bad News" is the title of a song I was choreographing last night, for Hastings HS's women's show choir. It's a fun gospel-y type piece, from The Wiz. You can YouTube it for some entertainment.

Unfortunately, that hasn't been the theme around here lately. We found out last week that one of my aunts is very, very sick.

We also found out that our 4-year-old neighbor boy, Connor, has been in an intentional, medically-induced coma for the last 7 weeks as he awaits a heart transplant. He's had 3 open heart surgeries in his life and his family's health insurance has been completely exhausted. They are a sweet, quiet family who would love to be able to see their little boy open his eyes and smile again.

And I opened up the paper today to find the obit of Josh Moon, a 13-year-old boy who'd been really involved in Ashland in the last few years. If you saw Guys & Dolls, the Ashland teens' 2008 summer camp show, he played Lieutenant Brannigan. That kid worked SO HARD to get that Irish accent right, and we were all so proud of him. He had a brain tumor.

Anyway, so my heart has been torn in two these last few days. Of course I'm so grateful for Lucy and Ed and Joel -- we carved pumpkins yesterday and I will post pics later. But I'm also really thankful for the Bible study I've been going to the last few weeks. It's really easy to get mired down in the WHY and the HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN of bad news, and I know I'm not strong enough to tough it all out on my own. Not only that, but I'm often hit with this feeling that I want to DO something to help, but haven't been able to figure it out. Through the study I've been able to pray and open myself up to God's wishes -- one of our actual prayers last week was simply, "Lord, what do you want me to do?" -- and I'm not joking, He gave me some great ideas. How about the timing on THAT! Awesome!

Anyway, one teeny little thing I can do is post some more info on Connor. If you are a bajillionaire looking for a cause, here you go:

Fundraiser for Connor
Saturday, November 7
Casa Vieja Mexican Grill
2176 West 7th Street, St. Paul, MN 55116
$10 All-You-Can-Eat Taco Bar from 1:00-6:00 PM
Raffle - silent auction - petting zoo - games - music

Donations may be sent to:
Highgrove Community Federal Credit Union
1804 7th St. W.
St. Paul, MN 55116
attn: Love for Connor Benefit

More information:
Local news story, KSTP
Connor's CaringBridge site

The tooth is out!

Lucy lost her first tooth today. I wish I'd videotaped her phone calls to both sets of grandparents, and three of her aunts.

"My tooth is loose. No, it's gone. It's out. I lost it in dance class. It fell onto my TONGUE! It's sooooo small! I can't even believe how small it is. I want to keep it one more night so I can look at it tomorrow. I love you too, do you want to talk to your sister/brother/daughter/son?"

Friday night update

Hey gang, sorry I've been real lazy. Just thought I would check in to say hello... Hello! Things are good.

Real quick:

Lucy is enjoying school (she cannot WAIT to get on that bus every day, and gets off it with a giant smile at 4pm) although every day she comes home and says she has a bad day. This mostly seems to be due to her not being able to use the computer in the room. I have no idea what the deal is with computer use -- when they get to use it and how turns are determined -- but I do know that girl loves computer time.

Ed and I are adjusting to our afternoons alone. I usually try to schedule grocery trips during the afternoons now, and Ed is only sometimes reluctant to be dragged about town. Generally he's a trooper, loving anything he can "help" with. Like holding the Cub Foods ad after I have torn all the good coupons out of it. Ed hasn't been napping since mid-summer, but he passed right out yesterday afternoon at around 3pm. I thought he was just playing in his bed, but next thing you know it's 3:30 and I'm dragging him out of a surprisingly deep slumber. Then tonight after I put him to bed, he was playing with some plastic animals while lying on his back in bed, and dropped one of the animals on his face. It hurt quite a bit (judging from the tears). Silly little man.

Oh! I should also mention, a couple weeks ago I was babysitting for a friend's 2 kids, age 4 and 1, in the afternoon. The baby was napping and Ed and Henry were playing on the main level when Ed knocked his face on a doorknob. His first breath, understandably, was just a wail -- but in his second breath, mid-cry, he whimpered "I woke up the baaaaaabbby!!!" My sweet guy.

Jean and her boyf Cameron ran the Twin Cities Marathon last Sunday and Jean kicked some serious butt, finishing under 4 hours, 15 minutes. Cameron finished too -- quite a feat considering his bum knee. Joel's sister Julie and her fiance Jeff ran the 10-mile and we got to see them, too -- I'm so proud of all 4 of them! We had a really lovely, albeit brief, visit with Joel's parents, Cameron's parents, MY parents, Ellen, and Jean's friends Rhi, Rachel and Carolyn.

Lucy's loose bottom teeth are REALLY loose and I can see one of her permanent teeth poking through already. I also think one of her top front teeth might be loose. The wiggling and subsequent pain is really bugging her, and her whining is really bugging me. Though I completely understand -- I have dreams about loose teeth and it's no fun!

My various activities (ECFE, rollerblading, volleyball, Annie, Bible study, dance classes -- to name a few) are keeping me hoppin' and keeping my house a cluttery mess. I've found some help in FlyLady.net -- she advocates not "trying to catch up" with regards to housework, but starting where you are and just cleaning for 10- or 15-minute bursts. It's helped me out a lot; though I keep falling off the wagon, the good news is the wagon is willing to stop and wait for me to get back on.

The other day Ed was talking to himself and I heard him say "Just, ahh, walk around, enjoy the fun!" He has a great future ahead of him on a theme park welcoming committee.

Today I was telling Lucy how Julie was going to drive Lu and Ed up to Monti this weekend to see Joel's parents. Lucy asked me to make sure I packed some snacks for the drive, because "Julie doesn't know that we get cranky when we don't get snacks." I do appreciate her forethought.